Mothers Who Murder (29 page)

In 2003, Margaret Jalaty murdered her four-year-old daughter, Alia Maarbani (also frequently known as Talia), after giving her a fatal dose of methadone.
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This was not the first time Margaret had given the toddler the drug. Criticism was levelled at social services after Talia’s death, as they failed to inform police of the near-fatal overdose. Social services had been under the impression that the child had accidentally taken her mother’s methadone, which Jalaty was prescribed as an analgesic following a car accident. The question was asked whether, had police been informed and an investigation initiated at that stage, the child could have been saved.
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This is a now sadly familiar query in relation to these cases. In fact, there had been concerns about Talia’s welfare from the time she was born on 21 October 1999, in terms of her neurological condition, for which a doctor at Sydney Children’s Hospital, Randwick, had prescribed clonidin.
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Talia was later taken off this drug after consultation with a paediatrician, Dr McCahon, at the Children’s Hospital in Westmead on 29 June 2003. On 22 August, McCahon reviewed Talia’s health and determined that her neurological condition had improved, principally from the termination of her being administered clonidine. However, just a few days later, on 25 August, Talia was admitted
to Bankstown Hospital suffering cardiac arrest. She was transferred to the specialist children’s hospital in Sydney, where she was successfully treated. A urine sample collected that same day tested positive for methadone. Dr Williams, who treated Talia, told Jalaty that ingesting methadone can be fatal for a child of Talia’s age; at this time she was just under four years old. Jalaty lied to Williams, telling him she had no idea how Talia could have methadone in her system. However, in her own evidence during her trial, Jalaty told the court that she had listened very carefully when the doctor had informed her how dangerous the drug was for children, and she knew full well that even a small amount could kill.

Even though she admitted to having this knowledge, on 23 November 2003 (Talia was by this time four years and two months old), Jalaty again gave the child methadone. On this particular night, Jalaty had a male guest at the house, Jason Riggs. Jalaty maintained throughout the trial that she was innocent of intentionally administering the drug, and that on the fatal occasion either Talia had accessed the methadone herself or Riggs had given it to the child. Justice Michael Grove
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presided over Jalaty’s jury trial, at the conclusion of which the jury were satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the accused had both dispensed the methadone and that she had done so intentionally. The motive given was that she wanted Talia to stop being an interruption to her relations with Riggs on that night. More than that, Jalaty’s actions were considered reckless as she appreciated the potentially fatal consequences and gave the child the drug regardless. The Crown’s position was that Jalaty’s intent was, in the end, to murder Talia. The jury agreed. Jalaty was convicted and given an overall jail term
of twenty years with a non-parole period of fifteen years for Talia’s murder and five years for the maladministration of the methadone. Her sentences will run concurrently.

No evidence was put forward to suggest that Jalaty’s actions were influenced by depression or any other mental disorder.
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It was recognised at trial, however, that Jalaty had had a difficult life, with evidence that she had been raped, and that she had been sent to Lebanon and forced into two organised marriages. She then suffered a serious back injury in a car accident, for which she was given strong pain medication that led to drug addiction.
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Jalaty fell pregnant by Talia’s father, Michael, but the two came from very different cultural backgrounds, which led to Jalaty’s family rejecting her. I would imagine this made her feel more isolated. In addition, Michael did not want the child, but Jalaty refused his suggestion to terminate the pregnancy. One of the reasons Jalaty was so determined to continue with the pregnancy was that for many years she had been told that she was medically unlikely to be able to have children, leading her to consider Talia her ‘miracle baby’.
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Jalaty was, unsurprisingly, scarred emotionally and psychologically by these events. How they affected her treatment of Talia is difficult to determine, but even after her conviction she maintained that she loved her daughter, even if her actions did not bear that out to those looking on.

IN CONCLUSION

All the cases we have looked at in this chapter have one thing in common – the parents or guardians of the child victims killed them. The reasons vary, but the outcome is the same. There are also discernible patterns to a lot of the circumstances surrounding the child’s death: a break-
down in communication between different social services departments charged with protecting vulnerable people; inexperienced social workers with a lack of skills required to diagnose and manage serious cases like Victoria Climbié’s and Peter Connelly’s; a failure to establish suitable procedures; and perhaps the worst of all, totally inadequate resources – including financial and personnel – to meet demands. Then there are the offenders. The most notable trend in the cases in this chapter is the complete lack of empathy they showed towards the children in their care. The levels of emotional vacancy are truly staggering.

Connelly appears to have been neglectful and abusive partly as a result of being more focused on her relationship than on her child’s welfare. The same elements appear with Fabienne Kabou and Margaret Jalaty. But the murderous couples that killed Victoria Climbié, Daniel Pelka and John Ashfield were not acting out of selfish love, nor was Emma Wilson. Their motives remain, to me, completely oblique, and frustratingly confusing as a result.

The fact that there is a discernible pattern should make it easier to detect the abuse before it goes too far, before another child dies. What is clear from the case reviews is that it is simply not that easy to police. If people want to harm their children they can be incredibly deceptive and clever in covering their tracks – misleading professionals, spinning webs of lies to cover the neglect and abuse, and ultimately hiding the child away so no one sees the damage being caused. Perhaps we should all, as individual members of society, take some collective responsibility for the safety of our children. Maybe that is simply a utopian ambition. Regardless, an answer of how to better protect the vulnerable victims needs to be found.

After reviewing these cases, I noticed one important thing – I did not find any women who have been prosecuted (or even taken to the pre-trial stage) for multiple filicide in the UK when the deaths could otherwise have been attributed to SIDS. It looks as if my theory may be correct: the Crown Prosecution Service won’t be going near that one again for possibly a long time, or at least until our understanding of the very complex nature of SIDS is significantly improved.

What struck me looking through the case details available, especially those in New South Wales and therefore my new locality since relocating to Australia, was that although women are certainly among those who kill their children, men are often involved as co-offenders and sometimes as the main protagonist. We hear all the time in the news how men are the main violators; then there is the shock when a woman harms a child, as they are seen as the nurturers, the carers. When a man commits a violent or murderous act, even against one of his own children, the same shockwaves don’t resonate through society as when a woman wields the weapon. People seem to have two levels of social conscience and expectations: one for men and one for women.

In my conversations with people around this topic I have been left with the impression that many will make endless excuses why women would commit crimes – even heinous, violent and sadistic acts – as I have done throughout this book, looking for answers or explanations as to why. When a woman acts, there has to be a why. When men commit violent acts, we almost accept it is part of the ‘masculine role’. That made me wonder whether our stere
otyping of criminals, in terms of the relationships between men and women who kill and their victims, is borne out by the facts.

I did find one notable difference between the sexes when I ran a search of cases listed under ‘killing of children by parents’
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– a search that did not differentiate between a mother or father, or even grandparent, having committed the act – which was that when women in this category kill they (generally) only murder the children or the children and themselves, but often when the men kill they murder the children and the adult woman. Sadly, with both men and women murderers, it is often nothing to do with the children at all; they are often incidental, almost pawns in the power game of the adults. The men who murder are often focusing on the
woman
and are either intent on getting rid of them or have an intense fear of losing them. Sometimes they kill to cause a reaction in the woman, often punishing the female for a perceived indiscretion such as starting a new relationship with another man. At its most basic emotional level, it’s a case of tit for tat. The killing of the child could be argued to be an act aimed at the adult female.

Something else we hear is that men and women kill for different reasons: women for love, men for revenge, or stereotypes of that kind. I’m guilty of making those same types of judgements myself when I hear about an incident on the news; I also leap to conclusions. But then my professional brain makes me stop and step back. I’ve applied that ‘backward step’ to my thinking here.

As I was reviewing the cases of the women who killed their own children – and some of them have, without a doubt – I began to wonder if things are that clear-cut, as in some
of the cases we’ve looked at love does not seem to feature highly as a motive in the callous acts of the women involved. I decided, if I was going to really look at why women kill, and if the dichotomy of behaviour exists between the sexes, I also need to look at why
men
kill. Fair’s fair. We all hear about the man’s revenge killing, but I get the feeling we are being too simplistic, as that doesn’t reflect the expanse of human emotional variation between people – even considering the notion that men are from Mars and women are from Venus. This basically implies that men are selfish and vindictive and love doesn’t come into their actions. From what we’ve seen, women can be selfish and malicious too. So my question is – why do men kill their own children?

THE MEN WHO MURDER

In 2000 Sung Eun Park was convicted of murdering his wife and two children, aged two and three, on the night of 17–18 October 1996. The circumstances around this triple murder were that Park had left his wife and had begun a relationship with another woman, Ms Hwang. Park’s estranged wife and their children remained in the family’s flat in Eastwood, a suburb of Sydney. Mrs Park did not initially know that Mr Park was living with Hwang, and when she became aware she visited the couple and an argument ensued. The police were called, which angered Park as Hwang’s visa had expired and she was in the country illegally. Park was also known to have had a gambling habit, and in the year prior to the murders he was constantly short of money.

By October 1996 Mrs Park was receiving social security payments, and she also approached the Child Support Agency for help. That agency wrote to Mr Park, telling
him that he was responsible for the financial support of his children, but due to his low wage he was not required to make payments at that time. That could change if his financial circumstances improved. This letter also angered him, and it appears it may have been the straw that broke this camel’s back, as Mrs Park and the children were last seen alive that afternoon. That night, Park went to the flat and murdered all three of them; all had been suffocated by placing a plastic bag over their heads. Mrs Park had been incapacitated first, followed by the two children. Their hands and feet had been tied. He then dumped the bodies in bushland. Park was convicted of the murder of his wife and two children. His motive was listed as self-interest, as he was considered to have murdered his family so that he could rid himself of their burden and pursue his relationship with Hwang. He received a sentence of twenty-six years with a non-parole period of nineteen years and six months.

Park appealed the length of his sentence, but was unsuccessful on the grounds that there were three separate murders, two of the victims were very young, and that the method used to murder the victims meant that each would have endured a frightening death. In addition, the appeal court took into consideration absence of any provocation, disability or other handicap to explain Park’s conduct, the partial premeditation in the killing of his children (after he killed his wife he must have then chosen to murder each child in turn), and the lack of any remorse.
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There was no torture or previous abuse. Compared to the women killers we looked at, aspects of this are similar to Kabou and Jalaty (see
Chapter 9
), who killed for completely selfish reasons. So this is not just a male-centric motive.

On 6 July 2001 Stephen Cheatham was found guilty of murdering his wife, Sandra, and his three-year-old daughter Briahna, and the attempted murder of his other daughter, Tahnee, who was three months old at the time. The circumstances are that on 5 March 1998, Cheatham was at home with his family. His wife went to bed at around 10.30 pm, but the offender stayed up watching television. During this period, he wrote two letters, one to his parents and the other to his wife’s parents, telling them that he intended to kill his family. He then went to the main bedroom where his wife slept and stabbed her five times in the back with a carving knife, after which he went to his eldest daughter’s room and stabbed her, then to his youngest daughter’s room and stabbed her in the cot as she slept. He then carried each child to the main bedroom and lay them on the bed next to their mother. The mother and eldest daughter died of their wounds, and only skilful medical care saved the baby. Cheatham then cut himself several times with the knife and hit himself over the head with a hammer, after which he went for a run with the intention of increasing blood loss as a result of his injuries, thereby committing suicide. He was discovered, lying next to a knife outside a school by a security guard with cuts to his neck and stomach and obviously in need of medical assistance. However, he told the guard he did not want help and instead wanted to be left alone to die. He told the guard and medics that he had given his family AIDS and could not bear his family living with the disease. He became very distressed when he was told that his youngest daughter had survived the attack.

Dr Rob Milton
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was the attending forensic psychiatrist, who assessed Cheatham forty-eight hours after the
incident took place. Milton diagnosed the offender as suffering from a condition known as hypochondriasis, ‘that is an excess of pre-occupation with physical disease and a tendency to interpret from very minor symptoms that the patient is suffering a fatal or serious disease’.
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When asked why he believed he had AIDS, Cheatham described some physical symptoms, but admitted he had been too scared to seek medical help. He was informed that his symptoms did not lead to a diagnosis of AIDS, but he disagreed, saying in his case they did. Dr Milton was of the opinion that Cheatham was delusional and preoccupied with the fact that he was suffering a fatal illness, which he believed he had passed to his family. Milton felt Cheatham’s actions were the result of this delusional state; Cheatham believed he was putting his wife and children out of their misery. Milton also believed the suicide attempt was genuine. On 9 March 1998 Cheatham was the subject of various medical tests while in Long Bay Prison
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hospital. Both the drug screen and HIV test were negative. Following review, the diagnosis was given as delusional disorder and hypochondriasis. He was considered to represent a severe risk of self-harm.

The offender admitted murdering his wife and daughter, and the attempted murder of his baby daughter. He was found guilty and received an overall prison sentence of twenty-four years, with a non-parole period of sixteen years for the murder of his wife, sixteen years for the murder of his elder daughter and twelve years for wounding with intent to murder his younger daughter. He appealed his sentence on the basis of diminished responsibility and that the original trial judge had not adequately guided the jury as to that defence. The conclusion was that the
court reduced his sentence to twenty-two years with a non-parole period of fourteen years, on the basis that the sentence would be served in protective custody and the fact that the sentence of twenty-four years did not take into account the offender’s ‘abnormality of mind’.
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Clearly in this case, a psychiatric disorder led to the deaths of this family at the hands of the father. It was an unusual and sad case. I have not found a case where a female offender has suffered from this type of psychiatric disorder, hypochondriasis.
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These are not the actions of a stable mind, and his suicide attempt appeared genuine. Cheatham seemed to believe absolutely that he had infected his family with a terrible disease. If we look at this from the offender’s perspective, it could be argued that he committed the crimes out of love for his family.

On 9 December 1999, Sandor Cikos murdered his de facto wife, Allison Penrose, and their two children, Jake aged four years and Travis aged eighteen months. As senior defence counsel highlighted, although there is no excuse for multiple murder, to understand the circumstances around the murders the relationship between the couple has to be examined. Cikos had been married before and it appears the woman was the dominant partner. When Cikos was thirty-two years old, and after thirteen years of marriage, the relationship broke down; by this stage they had three children. Initially after the separation he maintained regular contact with his children, but after he started a relationship with Allison his ex-wife started creating problems, to the extent that he virtually lost contact with the three children from his first marriage. Cikos and Allison intended to marry, but after Cikos suffered a series of work accidents that left him with multiple injuries,
including fractures to his right leg, their plans were put on hold. Nevertheless, the couple went on to have a family; Jake was born in 1995 and Travis in 1997.

Allison is described as having a strong, assertive character, and as being someone who enjoyed a social life and on occasions drank to excess. She was also quite an extrovert. One incident in particular appears to have had a profound effect on the relationship. Following a heavy drinking session at a nightclub with a group of friends, Cikos drove the group back to their house where they all continued drinking but he, as the designated driver and therefore sober individual, went to sleep. Allison then had sex in another room with two partners, a male and a female, and then took the female to the room in which her husband was sleeping as it was a fantasy of hers to watch him have intercourse with another female. But once this fantasy became a reality Allison became enraged, immediately berating her husband for having sex with another woman in front of her. She hit Cikos and ordered both him and the other woman out of the house.

The tirade of abuse continued in the weeks and months that followed, and it appears the incident became all-consuming for Allison. She assaulted Cikos a number of times, including attacking him with a knife for which he needed eight stitches on his elbow, which resulted in an Apprehended Domestic Violence Order being taken out against her. Things reached a head when Allison gave him an ultimatum: either he kill the other woman he had slept with or Allison would have him killed. She set a deadline for the other woman’s death as February 2000. Allison told Cikos that if he left or went to the police she would arrange for something to happen to him. After months of
physical and emotional abuse, Cikos felt that murdering his partner was the only option left available to him.

Again, experienced psychiatrist Dr Rob Milton was the attending expert. Milton examined Cikos and came to the conclusion that the offender was not making the story up. He considered that what led to Allison’s death was her overwhelming jealousy combined with the offender’s inability to cope with her extreme reaction to the situation of the sexual encounter she initiated with her friend. The murder of the two sons was more problematic to explain in terms of motive, and Milton found no evidence of any cognitive defect or significant mental disorder. Cikos gave evidence that he had thought about killing his partner for some time, but the only difference at that moment was the imminent deadline she had set him for killing the other woman. He also said that he had not decided on when, until after she had gone to bed. The timing at least was not premeditated. He took a piece of pipe from downstairs and went back upstairs to where Allison was sleeping; he then proceeded to strike her on the back of the head with the pipe. This caused her to turn over, at which point he manually strangled her. He then went into each of the children’s rooms and put plastic bags over the boys’ heads but they did not suffocate; he strangled both of them. The only reason he could offer was that he could not bear the thought of them going through life with the pain of having lost their mother.